


Blood and Crushed Veneer

by aseriousbunburyist



Category: Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: Gen, Pre-Slash, pre-into darkness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-07-10
Updated: 2013-07-10
Packaged: 2017-12-17 13:03:33
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,711
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/867847
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aseriousbunburyist/pseuds/aseriousbunburyist
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's a wonder he can still function, still breath, when so much of him is scar tissue. But then, they always said Jim Kirk was impossible.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Blood and Crushed Veneer

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to [ischiri](http://archiveofourown.org/users/ischiri/pseuds/ischiri) for yelling at me to finish it and then just yelling afterwards.

"I mean, a couple more years studying Dinaali anatomy, and you might know as much about it as I do."

"Jim, if you make another goddamn joke while we're on our way to a distress call-"

"It's not  _that_  bad, Bones. They just hailed us."

"No, they sent out a wide-band subspace signal."

Jim frowns. "Did they? Well, we'll be there to reassure lives, re _affirm_ lives, save lives, whatever. Saving lives, Bones. Saving lives!" Jim repeats, with hand gestures. "Be excited! We're doin' the oath proud."

Bones thinks that maybe if he glares hard enough he'll break the spacetime continuum and open a rift that'll suck Jim into a parallel universe. A harmless one, with low gravity, consisting solely of the type of padding they use in solitary confinement cells. God knows he'd gotten close last time.

***

"Bones, you are with me on this, right?" Jim asks playfully, later, when they're two hours out, but his eyes are searching. As if the answer could ever be anything other than  _yes_ , and damn if it doesn't make Bones want to cuff the kid and force him to have some faith in himself. But he doesn't, instead rolls his eyes, says, "Where the hell else would I be?" 

And it's meant to be casual but Jim gets that it's not, the bastard, so he pats Bones' shoulder and starts to walk away.

Bones says, "You come back," and leaves off the  _to me,_  even though Bones is always the one chasing Jim.

"Always do, Bones," and Jim's serious for half a second before adding, "On a related note, did I mention you're on the landing party?"

"Must have slipped your mind. I know how hard it gets to function when the hamster that runs the wheel in your head takes a break."

And when they step onto the transporter later with Spock and the security detail ("For show, Bones.") Bones says, "I hate this," and means it, means something else, too.

"I know you do," Jim says with a smile, and it's enough.

***

"It appears we slightly miscalculated the extent of civil unrest."

"Slightly, my ass." Bones growls.

"Crude. But accurate. Jim, I would recommend we proceed with caution, and all possible speed."

"Right. Bones, can you take the injured to that building and try to comm the transporter room? We'll meet back here and beam up when this _disaster_  is resolved." And because Jim is built for command, he and Spock are gone before Bones can blink. And Bones can hate it all he wants, but he knows this separation is the best division of skills, and so he shuts down the part of him that over analyzes, that focuses on Jim Kirk and his death wish, and saves lives.

And when the first explosion hits, not the city council, or a military outpost, but a civilian building housing the injured, the second before he's knocked off his feet, Bones figures it had to happen eventually.

***

Mortality is not a relevant factor in moments like these. In moments like these, Bones is a doctor, plain and simple, and that doesn't leave room for something as benign as personal casualties. Death is for other people, it's the consequence of his mistakes, death is a punishment, and Bones' penance is living. Death thinks it's for the likes of Jim Kirk, but not if Bones can help it. He'll stand in the way every time and then some, because the first time he put Jim back together his shaky foundation felt solid.

_There are people that need help (need help)_

Humanity is beautiful, and sometimes Bones feels it so completely that he wants to be embarrassed with himself.

_He has to contact the medbay (the people are dead)_

And Bones isn't one for panic. (Now, worry for Jim Kirk is a different beast  _entirely_. It's substantiated, for one thing.) So he inhales slowly, winces. ( _Diagnosis_ : multiple rib fractures, check lung contusion;  _treatment:_  analgesia, possibly binding). Doesn't try to shake off the dizziness ( _diagnosis_ : mild to moderate head trauma;  _treatment_ : acetaminophen) and lies still. Doesn't register the lack of feeling from waist down, or the amount of blood soaking into his standard issue.

(It's just, he kind of figured that when he was left in the wreckage, Jim would be here with him.)

He turns his head, looks along the line of his outstretched arm to what remains of the doorway. Tries to move his fingers.

_He's gotta tell Jim-_

He wishes the weight on his chest would dissipate so he could breath easier - _pronounced tachypnea, symptom: stage 4 hypovolemic shock, treatment_ \- he has to tell Jim - _treatment_ \- just wants some goddamn clarity-

_Jim will come (They promised they wouldn't do this, not again)_

Not everyone was built to withstand cosmic pressure, designed to live through anything. So Bones breathes, keeps his eyes open. Thinks that  _just this once_ , he'll wait for Jim Kirk, and doesn't consider the fact that he's falling out of orbit.

***

"Lt. Sulu, life signs?"

"Negative, captain. I-"

"Scan again. Kirk out."

"Captain."

"He's not dead, Spock."

"I was not suggesting-"

Jim speeds up, walks ahead, and he's never been more in control, in command, because when he's captain he is more than human, and no one dies.

***

Except they do. And Bones does. It adds a mark to his soul, layered over countless others, but cuts deeper. It's a wonder he can still function, still breath, when so much of him is scar tissue. But then they always said Jim Kirk was impossible.

***

Spock finds Jim halfway between the Medbay and his own quarters. Another time, Spock would have admired the precision of it. If asked, Spock might postulate that Jim was caught, caught between being beside the body that isn't Leonard McCoy and being as far away as possible.

(And it's not that Jim can't face himself. He's been beating himself up his whole damn life. But guilt, judgement, from eyes that don't look back....)

The silence only plays for so long before Jim asks, still facing his viewport, "Why is it that I'm looking at the Capellan system?" 

"We are currently on course for Earth, Captain."

"On whose authority?"

"I laid in the course personally, after contacting the admiralty in regards to the possibility of a planet side funeral for Dr. McCoy and-"

"-don't-"

"-and, while unorthodox, it is not unheard of." Spock pauses. "It is my understanding that Leonard would have found a funeral at space... ill-fitting. I, too, do not think it a proper procedure." 

Jim nods, but doesn't engage further. He's barely upright, spinning on an axis like he's lost his inertial frame. Spock takes a chance, says, "I believe, were he here, that the good doctor would take this opportunity to state that refusing to acknowledge what has happened is inadvisable for your well-being. Physically and mentally." 

"Didn't take you as the type for cheap shots, Spock. Why wasn't I alerted that you'd become our resident psychologist?"

Jim's causitic defensiveness, while grating, is a rational expression of his loss, so Spock doesn't comment. "The point stands that you are blaming yourself and compartmentalizing in an attempt to avoid-"

"Is that all, Commander?" 

"You can not continue this willful denial in the hope that you will not have to accept the truth of what has passed." For a moment Spock thinks he has miscalculated, but Jim finally turns to face his accuser. 

"That right?" and coming from Jim, it's a challenge, it's a plea. He says it like it's his last defense, like he's begging Spock to let it go. Because Jim knows he's not all there, but he needs it, needs this, his position, holding him up. Like this eye contact is all that's supporting him, this facile of command, this obligation to do well by his crew. And because Jim can't, Spock makes the necessary decision.

"You are relieved, Jim."

Jim exhales, ragged. Looks away, holds on, holds himself together for another heartbeat. Watches his control slip away with his last layer of protection, and when he falls he catches the window ledge, like an altar, like he's seeking forgiveness. And his hands grasp when they don't find what they need, and he can't breath, because this is his proof; it's too much to ask of anyone alive, to be Jim Kirk's friend.

***

On earth, Jim leaves quietly, for once. He's tired, tired of trying to accept meaningless platitudes at this wake, tired of trying to call him Leonard, and then Dr. McCoy. So Jim goes outside, to the edge of light from building and sits, small on the side of a planet that hasn't been home for years.

He sets a bottle of bourbon beside him (can't help but think he's honouring Bones more this way, and it becomes a tradition, this toast, while he wonders if Bones would have dealt with it better.) He settles his arms around his knees and stares at the night. He wants to hate it, space, but he can't, never could. Whispers his first, "I'm sorry", cuts his mouth on it, and drinks.

An age later, when the light flickers behind him announcing another person, he turns so quickly he hates himself for it. Hates himself for expecting to see someone else in the doorway, with a glass and a, "Move your ass over, you reprobate."

Spock approaches and folds neatly to the ground beside Jim, eyeing  the bottle and his hunched posture. "Is that the most logical remedy for your current condition?"

" _Condition._ You askin' if I'm emotionally stable, Spock?" And his mouth curls on "stable", like he could be amused, if that was a thing he was capable of feeling right now.

"I would not have phrased it that way."

"It's- whatever. I'm not- I'm not going for a dive off the ol' Golden Gate, alright?" Jim says with a huff and a parody of a smile, rising to his feet. He squeezes Spock's shoulder as he passes, a silent apology for needing space. His fingers slip away as he walks farther, and Spock gets the confession as if said aloud. Jim is not self-destructive, nowhere near it. Spock feels it deeply, this impression Jim leaves behind in the negative.

Jim's penance is living.


End file.
